Deloitte named best accountancy 'brand'

Main points

British Airways retains its top spot as the UK’s favourite “Superbrand”.

Deloitte has been rated as the leading brand in the Accountancy and Business category.

High-tech brands showed strongly in the Business Superbrands table, but less so in the eyes of consumers.

Deloitte has been named 'top brand' in the accountancy and business services category for the second year running, in the UK “Superbrands” survey.

The Superbrands survey was compiled by the Centre for Brand Analysis and based on a poll of 2,000 business professionals (for the business brands), 2,500 members of the public (for the consumer brands) and the opinion of an independent expert panel.

The overall winner in both the Business and Consumer Brands surveys was British Airways, which retained its number one position from last year, with technology giant Apple in the number two slot, again the same position as last year. Despite being the winner in its category, Deloitte did not make it into the top 20 “Business Superbrands”.

The top 10 Business Superbrands are (last year’s position in brackets):

British Airways (1)

Apple (2)

PayPal (16)

Google (7)

Microsoft (4)

Visa (5)

Virgin Atlantic (3)

MasterCard (6)

BP (17)

IBM (9)

Technology-based brands fared better in the Business Superbrands table than in the Consumer survey, with Paypal up to third place from sixteenth and Google up to fourth from seventh.

In the consumer table, however, the tech giants struggled while some “heritage” brands displayed a strong recovery. Microsoft dropped 16 places to just scrape into the top 20, while Google’s sixteenth place is well below previous highs for the search engine.

Toy giant LEGO swept up to third place and Heinz, Jaguar and Marks & Spencer all re-entered the top 20. Dramatically, national broadcaster the BBC slipped out of the top 20 for the first time since the survey began.

The top 10 consumer brands are:

British Airways (1)

Rolex (2)

LEGO (11)

Dyson (14)

Gillette (7)

Mercedes-Benz (8)

Apple (10)

Jaguar (-)

Kellogg’s (9)

Andrex (12)

Stephen Cheliotis, Chief Executive of The Centre for Brand Analysis, said: “The rejection of the new for trusted, traditional brands continues to defy expectation that some challengers, such as technology enabled or social based brands, would break through. In fact the reverse is true, with conservatism evident among the British public after years of crisis.

“Although change may be accelerating in many markets, changes in perception are much slower to come through. Consumers are continuing to seek out familiar brands with which they have an emotional connection.”